


Stars 4-Ever

by real_live_angelface



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Adulting is hard, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - No Powers, And are Creatives, Domestic Fluff, First Kiss, First Time, Inspired by Music, M/M, Modern Bucky Barnes, Modern Steve Rogers, One Shot, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Pre-Winter Soldier Bucky Barnes, Romance, Stars, They both have Day Jobs, Unrepentant Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-10
Updated: 2020-03-10
Packaged: 2021-02-28 17:48:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23061217
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/real_live_angelface/pseuds/real_live_angelface
Summary: Steve’s going through a rough patch. But even when he has nothing, he has Bucky.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Comments: 5
Kudos: 42





	Stars 4-Ever

**Author's Note:**

> Happy 103rd Birthday, Bucky Barnes! (MCU Bucky, that is.) I hope it’s a good one, where ever you are. I like to think you’re off with Steve, growing old together after having rescued your past self and past Steve from history’s clutches (with Peggy's help, of course). You’re probably about to blow out all the candles on your birthday cake right now. And Sam is there. And Natasha, too.
> 
> This fic was inspired by the Robyn song “Stars 4-Ever” from the album Body Talk. Some of the lyrics will feature in the story.
> 
> Not beta’d, but I polished it up as shiny as I could all on my own. My beta currently has her hands full with my Shrinkyclinks Fest submission. Stay tuned for that to drop on April 7!

“I got fired again,” Steve said, when Bucky opened the door. It looked like he hadn’t showered since his last shift, his blond hair flopping in a greasy tangle over his forehead, strands of it sticking up at the back of his head. He was still in his work clothes, food-splattered pants barely hanging off of his bony hips, shirt billowing around his bowed shoulders.

“Oh Jesus, Steve,” Bucky said, pulling him into the apartment by one thin wrist. “You smell like kitchen.” Oh, and there was the whiff he thought he’d caught when he’d first opened the door. “How much have you had to drink?”

“Enough,” Steve said, allowing himself to be maneuvered into the main room, resisting when Bucky tried to get him to sit down on the couch. “I’m disgusting right now. I can’t touch anything. I’ll just stand.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. It’s just a damn couch.”

Bucky hated when Steve got all weird about his stuff. So maybe he’d gotten more successful than he had expected as a personal assistant. And maybe he’d gotten involved a little too closely with some of his former clients, when he’d been younger and less experienced. And maybe that meant he’d ended up with a lot of really nice things that he was too stubborn to get rid of.

“It’s suede,” Steve said, and for being such a little guy, he really was hard to budge when he wanted to be. “Get a towel. An old one.”

“Ugh, you’re such a drama queen,” Bucky said, but did as he was told, digging for the towel he kept in the cat’s crate.

“Hey there,” Steve said, as said cat wound around his ankles. He bent over to pick her up and lost his balance, arms flailing as he fell over. Dasha zipped off to a safe distance before sitting down to give Steve a judgmental look, ears swiveling back, tail neatly curling around her paws.

“Here,” Bucky said, spreading the towel down on the couch and basically lifting Steve up onto it. He scooped up Dasha, who chirped loudly and head-butted his chin. “Keep him company for a minute, will you?”

He put Dasha in Steve’s lap and she leaned against his chest, purring up a storm. Steve smiled and pressed a kiss to the top of her head. Bucky ignored the pang of jealousy he felt at that. Ridiculous. Being jealous of his own cat. He should be glad Steve liked her so much, seeing as he was around all the time.

“I’m going to make you some food,” he said.

After Steve had scarfed two helpings of Bucky’s soggy excuse for last-minute spaghetti, lifting his bowl out of the way when Dasha tried to paw for her own helpings, he collapsed back against the couch, tilting his head up to stare at the ceiling.

“That was delicious,” he said, as Bucky settled down next to him.

“I’m no chef.”

“It was fucking good, I said.” Steve moved his empty bowl to the other side of the couch, out of Dasha’s reach. “I liked the fresh basil. Nice touch. You managed to keep that plant alive, huh?”

“Yeah,” Bucky said, grinning.

Steve took a deep breath. “Chef was a racist, sexist asshole. I finally called him out on it.”

“Oh.” Bucky blinked. “Well, good for you.”

“Yeah, I don’t regret that part of it. I regret not having a job.”

“I know.” Bucky squeezed his arm. “Hey, so maybe this is your chance to get out of kitchens. You’ve been wanting to bail for ages, anyway.”

“I don’t know how to do anything else,” Steve said. “You know that. I’ve been in it since you got me that bussing job at the diner when we were kids.”

“You’ve got plenty of skills. You just have to figure out how they translate.”

Steve sighed. “You’re better at that shit than I am.”

“I’ll help you,” Bucky said. “We’ll find something less…draining. So you can start painting again.”

“Hah.”

Bucky turned to look at him. “How long have you been feeling like this?”

Steve shrugged, sliding over to lean against his shoulder. “A few days...maybe.”

Which probably meant a week. Jesus. Bucky had been so absorbed between working on his novel and helping his client track down the perfect statement pieces for her vacation, he hadn’t noticed how long it had been since he’d last heard from Steve. They didn’t talk every single day, but close enough.

“Okay,” Bucky said, coming to a sudden decision. “You’re gonna shower and then we’re going for a drive.”

Steve was shaking his head against his shoulder before he’d even finished talking.

“It’s rush hour.”

“It won’t be bad if we avoid downtown.”

“Don’t you have to work?”

“Renée’s in Barbados. Gave me a few days off.”

That gave Steve pause. He lifted his head to stare at Bucky. “Wow.”

“Yep.”

“But your writing...” Steve began again, determined.

“Shower.” Bucky said. “Now. I’ll get you a change of clothes.”

“I’m not gonna fit into any of your clothes,” Steve said, but he was already moving Dasha off his lap, patting her apologetically.

“I shrank a sweater in the wash the other day,” Bucky said.

“Ha. ha. You’re hilarious.”

It took awhile to get out of the city, even avoiding downtown, and Steve was silent the whole time, staring out the passenger side window.

In the end, they’d swung by Steve’s apartment to get him a proper change of clothes, since he said he felt stupid with Bucky’s clothes hanging off of him.

Bucky had done his best to ignore the unprecedented level of disarray that was a painful reminder of Steve’s current mental state. He finally gave in to washing the dishes when Steve disappeared into his room to change.

“Stop it,” Steve said, catching Bucky with the scrubby brush in hand as he worked studiously on a food-encrusted plate. “It’s already embarrassing enough that you’re seeing my place like this.”

“It’s not a big deal,” Bucky said, rinsing his hands and setting the plate back into the sink. “You know I don’t judge, Stevie.”

“I don’t need to be taken care of, Bucky, okay?” Steve said, glaring.

So that’s how they’d ended up driving down the highway in complete silence, the radio doing little to ease the tension. Their friendship used to be easier, Bucky reflected. But then again, that was before Steve’s mom had died. Before they had graduated from high school and stumbled out into a world that didn’t seem to have a place for people like him, much less for Steve.

He wasn’t proud of some of the choices he had made, and some of the ways he’d had to make it work, but at least now he had carved a place out for himself. He’d lost count of how many times he’d wanted to roll his eyes at a client - to scream, to rage, to run away at having to smooth over some rich person crisis while the real world teetered on the edge of disaster around them. But he didn’t have the luxury to pass judgment, so he did his job and kept his mouth shut. Steve didn’t have the luxury, either, but he ran his mouth, anyway. It was something Bucky had always found both admirable and alarming about him.

“I’m sorry,” Steve said, as the city melted down to the sprawl of the suburbs, the traffic easing off just past the exit for the last main artery that connected city to country.

Bucky waited, keeping his eyes on the road, knowing it would take Steve a minute to get his words out in the order he wanted. It always did.

“It feels like you’ve always been there,” Steve continued. “I get scared about it sometimes. Of getting complacent.”

Bucky made himself wait through another long pause, his stomach twisting in knots because he wanted to talk so badly.

“I don’t want to forget what it’s like to be alone,” Steve said. “How to function alone. Just in case.”

“I need you, too, you know,” Bucky said, because he couldn’t hold it in anymore. “And you’re the most prideful and independent person I’ve ever met. It’s...maddening. For the people that love you.”

Steve turned to look at him.

“Let me help you,” Bucky continued, words pouring out as if something had broken open inside of him. “And let me do it without the drama, for once. Don’t you remember taking care of me after Brock cheated on me? Or when I dropped out of that MFA program?” Bucky took a deep breath. “It’s not bad to need people, Stevie.”

Steve sighed. They drove on in silence for another few minutes, Bucky remembering how, through all the blur of his twenties, the constant had been Steve, who had been too stubborn to give up on either of them. Steve had been there, always. And Bucky had been too scared to let himself think of what that could mean. Instead, he chose to distract himself with handsome strangers and morally ambiguous boyfriends. And booze. And drugs.

Then, seemingly out of nowhere, Steve had started dating Peggy Carter. The life Bucky had carefully built around himself came to a crashing halt. He stopped going out. He stopped dating, tired of the guessing games, the risk of being vulnerable with the wrong person, because they were all wrong. The right one had been there the whole time, and now he was gone.

It took a few years to claw his way out of that frozen wasteland. And through it all, Steve was still there. A little less often, since he had Peggy, but often enough. Then Bucky really hit his stride with his personal assistant career, securing clients who not only paid better but had a healthier sense of boundaries, too. And he wrote obsessively, every moment of free time that he had, until he finally finished the novel that had been rattling around inside of his head for well over a decade.

“I still dream about that pie you made me,” Bucky said. “Remember? After my book got rejected for the millionth time.”

“You never said.”

“I should have.”

“I’ll make it for you again,” Steve said. “Whenever you want. Just say the word.”

Bucky nodded, not trusting himself to speak.

“Where are we going?” Steve asked a little while later, as the suburbs gave way to farmland and then patches of forest as they began the long, winding climb over the pass.

“The coast,” Bucky said. “I packed some food. It’s in the back.”

“You think of everything.” Steve turned in his seat. “You want anything?”

 _You_ , Bucky thought. “Nah, I’m all right,” he said.

By the time Steve and Peggy had split, he’d convinced himself that he was over Steve. Way over Steve. It was funny how being a writer gave him the ability to be as inventive in his real life as he was in his stories.

* * *

It was windy on the beach, as it always was, blowing in sideways from across the ocean, dark waves crashing up onto the shore and rushing up toward their sneakered feet in teasing laps of foam and clear water.

Steve took his shoes off, even though Bucky said he was crazy. It was early spring, for fuck’s sake, and the ocean this far up north was always frigid, anyway. Even in the summer.

“I need to feel the water,” Steve said, shrugging.

Bucky hung back, watching him splash through the tide, until Steve turned to look back at him, waiting.

They ate lunch perched on a worn hunk of driftwood, some tree that had fallen into the water who knows how long ago. Steve leaned against him, face lit by cloud-filtered sunlight.

“Watch for that cormorant,” he said, as the bird disappeared underneath the waves for several long minutes, then bobbed up again in a completely different place. “I always guess wrong,” he added, laughing.

Then, “That poor stupid seagull thinks he’s not being obvious at all,” about the bird that was sidling closer and closer, eyeing their lunch with naked curiosity.

Then, “That wave looks like a mermaid, doesn’t it?”

There was something about the chill in the air, the salt air smell. The empty beach, like they were the only two people left in the world. It all narrowed Bucky’s focus down to where his body touched Steve’s, to the way the wind tousled Steve’s hair and reddened his cheeks. The funny quirk of his mouth when he laughed at the seagull’s nervous flapping jumps.

They drove home in the twilight, and by the time they’d reached the summit of the pass, the sky had cleared, stars shining down at them, the sliver of the waxing moon hanging heavy over the western horizon.

“Let’s stop,” Steve said.

It took a minute to find a good place to pull off the dark forest road, but Bucky found a turn-off with a nice bit of open sky. They stared up at the stars wordlessly, leaning back against the warm hood of the car until Steve gave a sudden shiver and turned to get back in.

Once Bucky had settled back in the driver’s seat, Steve put a hand on his arm.

“Thanks for this, Buck.”

“Of course,” Bucky said. “Anytime. You know that.”

“I’ve been miserable,” Steve said. “It feels like there’s no way out, you know? I fucked up college. I fucked up my relationship with Peggy. I fucked up so many jobs that could have been good. Really good. And now I’m stuck.”

“Yeah,” Bucky said, meeting his eyes. “I know. Just remember it’s temporary. I know you’re gonna figure this out. And I’ll be there with you through all of it.”

Steve sighed, leaning back in his seat.

“I know just what you need,” Bucky said, plugging his phone into the AUX jack on his car stereo.

“What are you doing?” Steve asked, eyeing him suspiciously.

Bucky scrolled until he found the song, giving Steve a mischievous look.

“No,” Steve said, as the first bubbling notes started up.

“Yes,” Bucky said. He hopped out of the car, sliding over the hood to Steve’s side.

Steve was shaking his head, digging himself into the passenger seat as Bucky opened his door. He reached in to crank the volume and Steve yelped, tumbling out of the car on the crest of the music.

“Dance with me,” Bucky said, as the beat dropped. Steve shook his head, but he let Bucky pull him into a ridiculous set of movements that were more half-hearted wiggling than dance.

_I can be right there next to you  
No matter where in the world you are  
I got you right here next to me  
Forever connected through the stars  
It's what we are_

“Come on, old man,” Bucky said, and Steve glared at him, but when the chorus started up, he relented anyway.

_You and me together, stars forever_

_You and me together, stars forever_

_(It’s what we are)_

They danced, carefree and erratic, moving in circles and splashing through muddy puddles hidden by the darkness, and as the song wound to an end, they collapsed together, laughing and breathless.

“Bucky,” Steve said, in the newfound quiet. “Do you really mean it?”

The stars glittered above them.

“Of course I do,” Bucky said. “I know you’re gonna figure it out. You’re smart. And resilient. And talented. And the strongest person I know. So...yeah.”

Steve hesitated, and Bucky wondered if he’d missed something.

“You’ll be there with me the whole way?” Steve asked, stepping closer.

“Always,” Bucky said, his voice catching.

“You and me together, huh?”

The song, Bucky realized, with a sudden flash of embarrassment. Steve was quoting the song. He had played Steve a cheesy love song without even thinking about it. How could he have been so transparent? He mentally reviewed the entire day they’d spent together, everything he’d said and done, his face warming at the realization that he had finally failed at his usual playing-it-cool routine. It was bound to happen sooner or later. He was only human, after all.

Then again, it could have been a cheesy _platonic_ love song, right? He could totally imagine playing the song to cheer up someone up in a completely platonic way. He hadn’t fucked up. It was going to be okay.

Then his senses caught up to his brain, slamming him back into the present moment at the feel of Steve’s hands coming to rest on his arms. The sliver of moon painting everything silver-blue. Steve’s eyes full of starlight. The expectant look on his face. He was waiting for something, Bucky realized. He had no idea–

“It’s what we are,” Steve said, with a slight quirk of his mouth.

“What?” Bucky asked.

“I never realized you felt this way about me,” Steve said, his voice raw. “I’m an idiot.”

“You’re not an idiot,” Bucky said automatically, feeling like the actual idiot of the moment.

Steve laughed. “Can I?” he asked, his hands sliding up to Bucky’s neck, thumbs caressing his cheeks.

Bucky wished he had shaved this morning.

“Bucky,” Steve said. “Stop panicking so I can kiss you.”

Bucky blinked down at him, the world spinning to a halt. He slid his arms around Steve’s waist. Leaned down to meet his lips...

Steve’s mouth felt so familiar, even though Bucky had only ever dreamt of this moment. It was still a dizzying revelation to taste him. He wouldn’t let himself think about how long he’d waited, because he was here now. He grunted as Steve pushed him up against the car, deepening their kiss with savage intensity before he pulled away.

“We better go,” he said. “Before some dude shows up with a shotgun.”

“Okay,” Bucky said, stunned and ecstatic and aching, aching for more.

“Take me home,” Steve said, leaning up to kiss him one more time, soft. “I’ll show you what else I can do.”

Bucky drove them home through the night, streetlights flashing over them like stars, Steve’s hand on his thigh, their fingers entwined.

“Don’t speed,” Steve said, as Bucky tried his best not to floor the gas pedal, anticipation pounding like blood through his veins. “Not too much,” he amended, as a pickup truck roared past them.

“No,” Steve said, as Bucky started to get off the highway exit nearest Steve’s place. “Take me _home_.”

Bucky glanced over at him and Steve smiled, reaching for Bucky’s phone and putting the star song on again, turning up the volume so that the music filled up the car, carrying them home.

As soon as Bucky parked the car, in a street spot miraculously close to his place, Steve climbed over the gear shift and into his lap. Bucky finally understood why he had been so afraid all these years. Once Steve decided he was in on something, he was in all the way. Bucky wasn’t sure how he was going to handle getting everything he’d ever dreamed of. It already felt like his heart might actually explode, and they were only just getting started.

They made it to Bucky’s apartment some time later, after some drunk kids had hooted at them from the sidewalk, and then Dasha needed to be fed, which Steve did obligingly as soon as they stumbled through the front door, still tangled in each other’s arms.

And then…then Steve just looked over at him.

“What is it?” Bucky asked, his entire body thrumming with nervous desire.

“I can’t believe I never noticed before,” Steve said.

It would be pointless, and somewhat cruel, to mention how long it had been. But somehow Steve seemed to know, his expression going sad and just a little bit reproachful.

“Let’s not do this, Stevie,” Bucky said, stepping closer. “What’s done is done.”

“Yeah, but–” Steve started, but Bucky didn’t let him finish, kissing the words right out of his mouth. It only took half a second for Steve to respond, surging up against him and grabbing his belt so that he could lead them back toward the bedroom.

Once there, Bucky pressed reverent kisses to Steve’s lips, his neck, his chest, tracing the spaces between his ribs, the curve of his belly, the edges of his hip bones. He let everything he’d kept hidden inside for so long pour out through his hands, his mouth, his entire body, and Steve poured everything out for him, too - just as reverently - until they were both illuminated.

In the early morning, Bucky woke feeling warmer than he’d felt in years. Dasha was curled up on his legs, and Steve was pressed up against his back, one thin arm slung over his waist. A single brilliant point shimmered low on the gray horizon, Venus winking brightly through the window. Bucky watched the sky change until he felt Steve stir behind him.

“You and me together, stars forever,” he said, his voice heavy with sleep.

“It’s what we are,” Bucky replied, turning carefully (so as not to disturb the cat) and pulling Steve into his arms.

“No, the damn song’s stuck in my head,” Steve said.

“Whatever.” Bucky was smiling so hard it felt like his face might break.

“It still applies, of course.”

“I know, Stevie,” Bucky said, rolling Steve onto his back and kissing him deeply. Dasha sprang off the bed with an indignant meow.

“Sorry, princess!” Bucky called after her as she trotted out of the room, her tail twitching. He looked down at Steve. “I imagine she’ll be expecting an apology cuddle later.”

Steve snorted. “You’re such a pushover.”

“No,” Bucky said. “I’m a responsible cat owner.”

“What about being a responsible boyfriend, huh?” Steve asked, and though his tone was teasing, Bucky could see the sincerity in his eyes.

“I can do that, too,” he said, softly.

Steve smiled.

They gazed at each other for another long moment, and then Bucky reached back to yank the covers over both of their heads, cocooning them together in warm cotton.


End file.
